


I Mean 'I Love You'

by NobodyOfficial



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Christmas, Fluff, Gen, Kidlock, Teenlock, holmes bros, young!Sherlock, young!mycroft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-07
Updated: 2017-03-07
Packaged: 2018-09-30 15:47:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10166330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NobodyOfficial/pseuds/NobodyOfficial
Summary: Sherlock meant to say I love you. He didn't. Mycroft wanted to say I love you. He couldn't.~Found my first ever Sherlock fic, when I was about 12. It's just little Holmes Bros loving each other and falling out. Not particularly canon compliant.





	

William stumbled down the stairs, desperate not to miss saying goodbye to his brother. He was the only person who understood him. The only person who wasn't an idiot. And now he was leaving William, for... Uni? Yes, leaving his little brother for something so mundane.

"Mycroft! Mycroft! Wait!" William wailed, rushing out of the front door and staring, shocked, as he watched his older brother's bags being loaded in to the car. He'd dreaded this moment, but there, watching it happen, watching him leave, it suddenly hurt a whole lot more. There would be no more playing pirates, no more bedtime mysteries. William was losing his only friend.

"It's ok Billy, I'm not gone yet," Mycroft said gently, kneeling down in front of his brother and placing his hands on his shoulders. "You're going to be good while I'm gone, aren't you?" He asked, smiling at William. William scowled back.

"You are coming back, aren't you Mycroft?" He almost whispered, looking up at his brother with wide, scared eyes.

"Y-yeah. Yeah Billy, I'm coming back," Mycroft stuttered, frowning a little. "Of course I am."

They stared at each other for a second, before William jumped on his brother and held him tightly. "Mycroft I love you!" He wailed, clinging to his brother's vest. Mycroft hugged his brother back, but with a concerned frown plastered across his face. He knew that that was the last time he'd ever be hugging his brother like that.

"I love you too, but you know we can't say that anymore, where I'm going," he said sadly.

"Oh," William nodded, pulling himself away from Mycroft.

William mind whirred at a hundred miles an hour as he thought of an alternative. Nicknames. Secret languages. Bedtime stories. Red-beard. Pirates. Games. No! He thought angrily. Those things didn't belong. He needed a place for them, he needed to lock those things away. They'd been in his thoughts far too much lately, with Mycroft leaving, and he needed rid of them. "Mind palace," William whispered. "I need a mind palace."

"What's that, Bill?" Mycroft asked, picking up the last bag beside the door. William had to be quick.

Code words. Code sentences. Random. Undetectable. Unrelated. "How's your diet?" William blurted out suddenly. Mycroft cocked his head slightly and smiled.

"Hey, don't be cheeky! I'm not on a diet," he said, ruffling William's curls.

"No, Mycroft," William begged desperately. "Really, really how's your diet?" Mycroft's smile turned in to a huge grin.

"Oh, clever Billy," he almost laughed. "You know what? It's fine, thank you."

"See what I did there, see?" William asked proudly. He no longer had any need to tell Mycroft he loved him. He'd found a better way. An easier way. A way with much less emotion.

"Yes, I see," his brother smiled.

For a moment William was blissfully happy. Maybe he could be as smart as Mycroft after all? But then Mycroft stood up straight and started to walk towards the car. William panicked, but there was nothing he could do. Mycroft had said he'd be back soon, William just had to trust him. Mycroft was the only person he trusted in the world, he had to believe him.

"Wait! Wait Mycroft!" William yelled suddenly. Mycroft stopped, but didn't turn around. "How's your diet?"

"It's fine, thank you," Mycroft smirked, before slipping in to the car and being driven away. That was the closest William had ever come to feeling home sick. Home was with Mycroft. Not with the idiots.

"Aw, Billy dear don't worry," William's mum said gently as she passed him in the doorway. "Myc'll be back soon."

"Sherlock," William mumbled unhappily.

"What's that dear?" His mum asked, turning and frowning at him.

"It's not Billy, it's Sherlock," he said, before heading up to his room. Someone was bound to be dead and Mycroft wasn't doing anything about it.

~

*eight years later*

Sherlock scowled as the car pulled up in the driveway. A sleek, black car. Visitors. And on Christmas. He couldn't think of anything worse. What was Christmas, anyway, other than a time of... Sentiment. Ugh, he hated that word.

A chauffeur stepped out of the car and opened the back door, allowing a young man to step out, maybe twenty six years old. Sherlock immediately tried to deduce things about him. The type of car says government. Sharp suit, and he's comfortable in it. Obviously his usual attire. A cold frown on his face, he doesn't want to be here. But the more Sherlock deduced about the man, the more familiar he seemed to be, until Sherlock stumbled back from the window, unable to look anymore.

Mycroft.

Sherlock looked around his room. It was a mess, scraps of paper, packets of cigarettes. He had to look on top of things. He had to act aloof.

Sherlock quickly grabbed his suit jacket from the bed and pulled it on, then shut his bedroom door firmly behind him. Undoubtably Mycroft would be leaving before the day was up, no time for a tour.

Just as the doorbell rang Sherlock reached the bottom of the stairs, so he pulled the door open and frowned. "Ah, brother. What a... Surprise," he said emotionlessly. He'd become quite good at that.

"Yes, it's great to see you again, Billy," Mycroft replied in an equally flat tone, but Sherlock could see in his eyes that he really meant it.

"It's Sherlock," he hissed, leaving the door and taking a few paces down the hall. His parents quickly engulfed Mycroft, saying how much they'd missed him and asking how university had been. Naturally, he said he couldn't reply to that question, so the door was shut and their parents gingerly shuffled past Sherlock to get back to the kitchen.

"Sherlock-" Mycroft started.

"Don't," Sherlock replied. "Let me. Hmm, government official, you've graduated I see. But that's not all, something else. More secret. MI5... 6. Yes, 6. The way you hold your head and the way you stand up straight and the way you curl your left hand. You've recently had your hair cut, you've grown two inches taller and gained nine... Ten pounds. So your diet's going terribly, I'm not going to ask because I know it's going terribly."

Mycroft was hurt. He didn't show it, but by God did he feel it. He hadn't meant to abandon Sherlock, to ignore his letters, his phone calls, to never come home. It was mandatory, no contact with anyone outside of the course. He still loved Sherlock, but he knew now that he couldn't just blurt it out like he used to.

"It's fine, actually," Mycroft said softly. Sherlock frowned, trying to deduce what his brother meant by this, but naturally Mycroft was guarded.

"No, it's not," Sherlock mumbled. "It's not fine, nothing's fine. But I'm fine. I'm fine without asking how your diet's going because I KNOW it's not fine!" He then turned and headed very calmly back up the stairs, leaving Mycroft with the shattered remains of the one tiny piece of sentiment he'd had left.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Hope that wasn't too bad, just found it and decided I should do something with it. Turns out my old writing style is actually better than some of the stuff I write now, I do not remember how to write at all! 
> 
> I have more baby Holmes Bros in my other fic 'Literally Goldfish' (what a cheesy title, jeez!) and I promise I will update my friends fic within the week. Maybe a long Mystrade fic this summer, if I can get some of it done when the holidays start. There. Will. Be. Fluff.
> 
> Thank you so much for reading this trash :)


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